Legal Experts Predict Trump's DOJ Case Will Be Dismissed: 'End of Story'

The Department of Justice (DOJ) is asking an appeals court to halt an independent review of documents seized from Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate, a move that legal analysts predict will mean another courtroom defeat for the ex-president.

Federal prosecutors on Friday filed a brief with an appeals court challenging the earlier appointment of a special master to sort out protected materials taken from Trump's home during an FBI search in August. Legal observers previously panned U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon's appointment of a special master, and they now expect the DOJ to prevail after winning a narrower appeal earlier.

At the request of Trump's lawyers, Cannon appointed Raymond Dearie, a senior federal judge based in Brooklyn, as special master to set aside seized materials shielded by attorney-client or executive privilege. The DOJ scored a win in September when the 11th Circuit Court in Atlanta ruled that roughly 100 documents marked as classified weren't subject to review by the special master.

The DOJ is now asking the same panel to release the roughly 11,000 documents still under review by the special master, which Duncan Levin, a former federal prosecutor turned defense lawyer, told Newsweek is "the next logical extension of where things are in the case."

"The appellate court's decision largely rendered the special master useless because the special master was left looking only at documents that were not classified," he said. "No one really cares about the documents that aren't classified."

Teri Kanefield, an author and former appellate court defender, predicted in a tweet that the DOJ was likely to prevail because Cannon didn't have the legal authority over the case.

She wrote in a tweet that Cannon previously acknowledged that Trump's rights had not been disregarded, and the DOJ would succeed in arguing before the appeals court that the ex-president didn't have any need for keeping government documents.

"There you go. End of story," Kanefield tweeted. "If there is no jurisdiction, the case gets dismissed. The whole thing goes poof."

Ryan Goodman, a law professor and former Pentagon special counsel, tweeted that Cannon's lack of jurisdiction over the case means the "DOJ will win hands down."

"It was an essential condition for Cannon to have jurisdiction," he wrote. "Cannon admitted Trump made no showing to meet the condition. End of story."

Joyce Alene said on Twitter that Trump's lawyers will have until November 10 to respond, and the DOJ will have until November 17 to reply. That puts an appeal decision within weeks of the December 16 deadline Dearie has to finish his review as special master.

Levin told Newsweek that the DOJ has already won an important victory by regaining access to classified materials and the current appeal is about establishing a "clear record about when a special master is appropriate and when a special master isn't appropriate."

"So on some level, this is symbolic," he said.

Newsweek has reached out to Trump's legal team for comment.